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An amazing group of salsa dancers are dancing for a cause: Latin dancers in the Philly-based group "Art In Motion" are bringing awareness to domestic violence.
Their short film "Santo" features the world champion dance company's newest choreography.
After seeing the choreography, Stephanie Ramones approached the dance company about doing a film with Florescio Films.
"It wasn't originally around domestic violence, but I saw it, and thought, 'hmm this could send a message' and I approached them,” Ramones stated.
A big part of using dance as an outlet was the nonverbal cues. You can see the women's bodies changing as they dance.
Darlin Garcia, founder and artistic director of the dance company, was ecstatic.
He said this is something they had never done before, "When I was approached about this I was like this is a real subject? How can we best show this through our dance form?"
They were faced with the challenge of using only visuals to display the dangers of staying in an abusive relationship.
Ramones and Garcia worked to create different choreography than typical salsa moves that the company is used to.
Playing the part of a woman who is domestically abused is extremely and emotionally draining.
The initial goal of "Art in Motion" the dance company responsible for the choreography, was just to raise awareness and cover the cost of production by raising funds on a YouCaring web page.
Ramones said it was a slow at first, "It was a trickle, but they held a social at the dance studio, the more people saw them dancing, it picked up."
They've since surpassed their goal and decided to donate all the proceeds to the Aim High Scholarship fund.
The scholarship honors a woman Aimee Gerard, whose life was cut short at the age of 26 due to domestic violence.
The group is still actively accepting donations through their web page www.santoproject.com.